Greg and Kathy Strauss would have loved to squeeze one more hockey team into the London Devilettes Girls Hockey Association tournament.

But with so many teams even a shoehorn would not have done the trick.

The tournament takes place Friday through Sunday throughout London and beyond. There will be 183 teams taking part in the 28th annual event, tying the record set last year for participating teams.

“I’m a little disappointed we couldn’t beat it by one so I could say we had a record,” said Greg Strauss who is co-chair with Kathy. “Hotels are our limiting factor right now with so many teams coming from out of town. We fill every hotel. We are pretty much at our max for our city. It should be a fun weekend.”

Strauss says there is a waiting list of 20 teams in various divisions.

“We are almost maxed out on ice (availability) as well,” he said. “We’ve expanded to Dorchester all day Friday with both pads this year as well.”

The Strausses have been co-chairs of the event for four years. They started with about 150 teams.

“We decided to push the envelope,” he said. “We’ve done it every year since. Next year we’re going to go for 184.”

It’s by far the city's largest hockey tournament. The teams, in 17 divisions, play 357 games. Teams come from Michigan, Whitby, Sault Ste. Marie and throughout Southwestern Ontario. A bantam team will be participating from Massachusetts.

Some 3,000 players from seven to 21 years of age will participate, including house leagues and competitive levels of novice, atom, peewee, bantam, midget and intermediate divisions. Many of those 3,000 players will bring along their families, making the weekend a gold mine for London in tourist dollars.

“It’s our biggest fundraiser for the Devilettes,” Greg Strauss said. “It would be interesting to see just how much revenue it raises for the city. It’s a great impact for the city. I know that our ice-time bill alone is somewhere over $100,000.”

He said running a tournament this big would be impossible without volunteers.

“This job really starts for the next tournament the day after the tournament ends,” he said. “We’ve had teams that come back and book their hotel rooms the very next day for the next year to make sure they can be in the prime hotels. The Devilette Association comes together really well and every team from the association kicks in volunteers for the tournament and it makes it successful.”

The tournament home base is Western Fair Sports Centre with games being played at eight other arenas. Play begins Friday at 10 a.m. All finals will be played at Western Fair starting Sunday at 9:45 a.m. with the last game scheduled for 3:30 p.m. There is no admission charge for the games.

One of the highlights of the tournament is a junior game at Western Fair on Friday at 7:30 p.m.

The Devilettes organization is in its 32nd season and has 800 girls from the ages of five to 21 on 27 house league teams and 19 competitive teams.

“Even though it’s a lot of work, it’s a great impact for the London Devilettes and the city,” Greg Strauss said.